In Dublin

A WOMAN yesterday said she travelled with author Gordon Thomas to

Mexico to interview the disgraced former Bishop of Galway, Eamonn Casey.

The bishop has claimed the interview, published in an Irish Sunday

newspaper, never took place.

Dympna Kilbane said she shared a flat with Annie Murphy, when Ms

Murphy was pregnant in 1974 as the result of her affair with the bishop.

Ms Kilbane confirmed she is taking legal action against Ms Murphy for

references made about her in the book, Forbidden Fruit, which tells the

story of the love affair between the bishop and the American divorcee.

Ms Kilbane, who is now married with four children, said she had

provided the Sunday Independent with a tape recording of a conversation

she had with Bishop Casey in which he called Annie Murphy ''an evil

woman''.

The conversation was taped in Cuernavaca, Mexico, where she had also

hoped to meet the bishop. She confirmed the Sunday Independent's ''world

exclusive'' was substantially correct.

However, Bishop Casey denied on Irish television that he had given an

interview to Mr Thomas.

Bishop Casey also said that he had agreed to meet ''an acquaintance

from Ireland'' in Mexico last Tuesday. He thought he was helping someone

who had been badly hurt by the book.

Ms Kilbane confirmed she had not kept an appointment with Bishop Casey

because a taxi driver got lost.

Mr Aengus Fanning, editor of the Sunday Independent, said yesterday

his newspaper paid the expenses of Ms Kilbane and a lawyer to travel to

Mexico as well as those of Mr Thomas and photographer Charles Collins.

Their travel expenses had amounted to #7000.

The newspaper had also paid in advance #1000 each to Mr Thomas and Mr

Collins. It had promised a further #3000 each after delivery of the

interview with the Bishop.

But syndication rights of the interview would bring #7000 royalties to

the newspaper, bringing the net cost to #8000. ''This is good value for

a world exclusive,'' Mr Fanning said.

However, the Sunday Independent faces sharp criticism from Roman

Catholic Church sources for intrusion into Bishop Casey's private life.

Bishop Brendan Komiskey, one of the most outspoken member of the Irish

hierarchy, has appealed to Bishop Casey to end his 11-month exile and

come back to Ireland to deal with ''unfinished business.''

Bishop Casey was believed to have gone to Ecuador to take up

missionary work. But a visit to Ireland cannot be ruled out as the only

effective way of satisfying public curiosity for his side of the affair

with Annie Murphy.